
Qass. 
Book. 









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LAMENTATION 



THE DEATH 



Abraham Lincoln. 






ISAAC S. DEMUND ^WA9«^ 




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LAMENTATION 



DEATH 



Abraham Lincoln, 

• itfyesident of the ignited $tatcs. 



ISAAC S. DEMUND, 

Pastor of the Reformed Dutch Church, Paramts, New-Jersey. 



MAY, 1SG5. 




gifa-fri: 

JOHN A. GRAY & GREEN, PRINTERS, 16 AND IS JACOB STREET. 



1865. 



The Consistory of the Church at Faramus : 

Rev. Mr. Demund : Dear Sir: We participate in the general sense of the 
loss sustained by our whole country in the death of President Lincoln, and cherish 
the highest regard for his virtues as a ruler and as a man. 

It would be very grateful to our own feelings to give permanent shape to 
any tribute to the memory of our deceased Fresident, and to the lessons of 
Providence. 

With the further view to meet a very general desire on the part of the con- 
gregation to have copies of your sermon upon the event, we unite in the request 
that you would furnish us with the manuscript for publication. 
Yours fraternally, 

PETER A. ZABRISKIE, 
JOHN I. VAN SAUN, 
ABRAHAM D. ACKERMAN, 
ALBERT A. ACKERMAN, 
THOMAS V. B. ZABRISKIE, 
HENRY CLAIR, 
JACOB Y. TOURSE, 
JACOB HOPPER. 
The Church at Faramus, May, 1865. 

To the Consistory, Elders, and Deacons of the Church at Faramus, N. J. : 

Dear Brethren : You have been pleased to request that the discourse lately 
preached by me on the death of President Lincoln, should be furnished you for 
publication, to meet the desire of yourselves and the congregation you represent. 

In manuscript form it is herewith committed to your hands, and to you and 
the congregation it is affectionately dedicated, in the prayerful hope we may all be 
enabled to profit as we should by the calamitous providence, value more than ever 
before the lofty principles and rich blessings of civil and religious liberty, and 
realize more deeply that nothing short of the cooperating grace of our Lord and 
Saviour, Jesus Christ, can sanctify them to us, and impart to our nation true great- 
ness, strength, and prosperity. 

Your pastor and fellow-servant in the Gospel of our Lord, 

ISAAC S. DEMUND. 

The Parsonage, June, 1865. 



LAMENTATION 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



" The king lifted up his voice and wept ; and all the people wept."— 2 Sam. 3:32. 

A civil war, long, fierce, bloody, that had raged between 
the house of Saul and the house of David, was apparently 
now on the eve of being brought to a speedy and happy 
issue. Xo less a person than Abner, who had strangely been 
a leader of Israel against him whom they all knew to have 
been chosen by the Lord to be the shepherd of his people, 
gives in his allegiance. He would gather all Israel to his lord 
the king. He would set up the throne of David from Dan to 
Beersheba. The anointed of the Lord should reign over all 
his heart's desire. The king gladly accepts the overture, and 
at once his servant proceeds to execute his noble purpose. 

In the mysterious providence of the Lord, however, Abner 
might not be the honored instrument of effecting the desir- 
able result. Joab, that led the army of the king, as if about 
to speak quietly with him, smites him under his fifth rib that 
he dies. With holy horror and righteous indignation, the king 
exclaims : " I and* my kingdom are guiltless before the Lord 
forever from the blood of Abner the son of Ner. Let it rest 
on the head of Joab, and on all his father's house." Shocked, 
disappointed, grieved, the royal mandate goes forth to Joab 
and all the people : " Rend your clothes, and gird you with 
sackcloth, and mourn before Abner." In the solemn obse- 



6 LAMENTATION ON THE 

quies, tlie king himself takes the lead. He lifts up his voice 
and weeps. The sympathy that swells in his bosom spreads 
around like a torrent. All the people weep. One elegy after 
another falls from the lips of the royal mourner : " Died 
Abner as a fool dieth ? Thy hands were not bound, nor thy 
feet put into fetters : as a man falleth before wicked men, so 
fellest thou." " So do God to me, and more also, if I taste 
bread, or aught else, till the sun be down." " Know ye not 
that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day in 
Israel ? And I am this day weak, though anointed king ; 
and these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me : the 
Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wicked- 
ness." 

"Was it not indeed a time to mourn ? "Who can wonder, as 
he reads or hears the simple touching narrative, that every 
eye should flow with tears % 

Sad, nevertheless, as that scene must have been, we, as a 
nation, have been visited with a far greater calamity, and that 
calls for more bitter lamentation. 

After the brief exegetical statement just made, and before 
we venture to consider that which is yet more afflictive, it 
may not be deemed improper that we should pause a moment 
to chasten the mingled emotions that agitate us, by lifting up 
our hearts with an humble hymn of adoration to Him with- 
out whom a sparrow cannot fall to the ground, much less a 
prince or a president : 

" Wait, my soul ! thy Maker's will ! 
Tumultuous passions, all be still ! 
Nor let a murmuring thought arise ; 
His providence and ways are wise. 

" He in the thickest darkness dwells, 
Performs his work, the cause conceals ; 
But though his methods are unknown, 
Judgment and truth support his throne. 

" In heaven, and earth, and air, and seas, 
He executes his firm decrees ; 
And by his saints it stands confessed, 
That what he does is ever best. 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 7 

" Wait, then, my soul, submissive wait. 
Prostrate before his awful seat ; 
And 'midst the terrors of his rod, 
Trust in a wise and gracious God." 

A greater calamity, it lias been asserted, has fallen upon 
our nation, than that which caused so much sorrow to king 
David, the sweet psalmist of Israel, and his people — greater 
indisputably, whether you consider the mode of its occur- 
rence, or the time, or the illustrious victim involved. 

It is no easy matter to divest death of that which is ter- 
rible, though it may not be properly deemed calamitous. In 
a good degree, nevertheless, we can reconcile ourselves to it, 
if it may only be that which we call natural ; that which 
comes from the hand of God in his ordinary way. 

Our nation, it is true, wept profusely when the great and 
good "Washington died. What sorrow could well have been 
more exquisite than that which then wrung the heart of the 
people ? But after all, could he have died at a more suitable 
time, or in circumstances more agreeable ? It must have been 
a luxury to weep that one who had the honor to lead our 
armies and counsellors to victory, independence, and liberty, 
should be permitted to pass unscathed through all the dangers 
he encountered, and die in peace at his own sweet home, with 
whatever love and skill could do to allay his pain and make 
soft his pillow. A tried Christian, an approved patriot, a 
successful warrior, and an eminent statesman, he said, with 
almost his latest breath, as he died hard by great physical suf- 
fering — and what could have been more becomingly said ? 
" It is well." 

Not thus sweetly, alas! was it with regard to him over 
whom our whole nation is now summoned to pour forth its 
bitter tears. 

His mode of death seems monstrous, without the least ex- 
tenuating mitigation, because unnatural, violent, inhuman, 
ungodly, fiendish. Joab and Abishai were held by David 
the king and his people inexcusable, execrable, though they 
thought to have screened themselves from guilt, because 
Abner had killed Asahel their brother in open battle. But, 



8 LAMENTATION ON THE 

in the assassin of the President of the United States, what 
are you not required to behold ? A desperado — acting as if a 
champion for liberty, and about to perform a glorious deed 
that would rank him with Brutus or Tell — assuming to him- 
self the prerogative of an avenger on behalf of his country, 
springing upon his unsuspecting victim and dealing the mor- 
tal wound that in an instant deprives him of consciousness, 
and in a few hours ends his earthly being ! If King David 
and all the people wept because of the mode of Abner's re- 
moval, how much more should our whole nation, North, South, 
East, and West, pour out tears like rivers of waters ! That 
our country should have given existence to such an assassin ! 
That a person so elevated as the President of these United 
States, should have been killed by a man utterly lawless, reck- 
less, abandoned ! Weep ! weep ! it becomes you to weep. 
You cannot easily exceed the bounds of propriety, though 
you should yield to unutterable anguish, because of such mi- 
me asurable atrocity. 

At length, too, the black cloud of war — surcharged with 
woe, that caused thousands to go down to their graves in 
blood, that desolated many pleasant homes, that multiplied 
widows and orphans, that made numbers childless — breaks 
away, as if we might soon have a clear and serene sky and 
a jubilant earth. Measures had been pursued with manifest 
advantage in the gigantic effort to save, if possible, our 
beloved country. Yictory after victory had been achieved 
over the hosts confederated against the Union. We need not 
concern ourselves about their special plea or their motives. 
One thing must be obvious even to themselves, that whilst 
they protested their inalienable and covenanted rights had 
been assailed and were in danger of being destroyed, many 
of them, of their politicians in particular, helped to introduce 
into power the very administration they denounced, and made 
its triumph the occasion long desired to tear themselves 
from the national embrace. They rose in their might, and so 
Bhook the Union from its centre to its remotest bounds, that 
many of its friends trembled and not a few of its enemies 
(.\iiltcd : it would be divided, if not ruptured and torn piece- 



DEATII OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 9 

meal — a ghastly spectacle — a wide-spread desolation. That 
power is broken. Their most renowned General, baffled in many 
tremendous assaults, finds himself at last in a situation in which 
he must either surrender or be mercilessly slaughtered. The 
magnanimous Lieutenant-General of our armies first moves to 
spare the further effusion of blood in a cause that had become 
hopeless and forlorn in the extreme. More gracious terms he 
could not well have proposed and required. By surrender, 
the officers would be spared from mortifying humiliation, and 
the soldiers, instead of being imprisoned, would be discharg- 
ed upon parole. Officers and soldiers would be permitted to 
return to their homes, nor should they be at all disturbed by 
the authority of the United States, provided they respected 
the Constitution and laws of the Republic. 

And now the whole country is roused to intoxicating ex- 
pectancy that the remnant lingering parts of the black war- 
cloud would, in like manner, be dissipated. The North were 
unmistakably for peace. And the South, though they had 
been the first in actual aggression, and though they had en- 
deavored to persuade themselves they had sufficient grievances 
to justify the cause they had taken, found themselves the great- 
est sufferers, and were perhaps more solicitous still to end a 
war they should never have initiated. That lesson we have 
been so slow to learn, seems now to be well understood and 
received. To the ballot, and not to the bullet, they must go, 
who would enjoy civil and religious liberty. It is in that 
way alone we may rectify any evil, real or imaginary. 

Now, then, it looked as if we had nothing more to do than 
to devise and adjust terms by which we might have a speedy 
settlement of affairs, and be, as once and that not long ago 
we had been, friends and brothers, and fellow-citizens under 
the same Constitution, abiding by the same ballot, and sub- 
ject to the same administration. Leniency, instead of trucu- 
lence, prevailed. The whole nation were reuniting to obliter- 
ate past misunderstandings mid injuries, to heal the wounds 
that had been made, and repair, as far as possible, the im- 
mense damage that had been sustained. We were preparing 
for a joyous outburst of high s;iti:4action because of the aspect 
of affairs, full of promise and interest. In a moment, an assas- 



10 LAMENTATION ON THE 

sin takes away the life of our President. Another inflicts se- 
vere wounds on the Secretary of State, lying in his bed se- 
riously ill. The cup of joy, we were about to drink, is suddenly 
dashed to the ground, and the cup of grief, filled to its brim, 
is pressed to the nation's lips. Who does not mourn ? Who 
does not weep ? Who ought not to be in bitterness and sor- 
row because of such a catastrophe at such a time ? At any 
time it had been dreadful. At none more than the present 
could it be more so, or more deplorable. 

Let our thoughts be next directed to that part of the trage- 
dy which is far more distressing, that which more than aught 
else increases our affliction. The victim of the assassin was 
a shining mark. How could effrontery or malignity sufficient 
have been commanded by the evil-doer to rush into the presence 
of one so distinguished ? In all the United States, no one 
was more prominent by position than President Lincoln. By 
free suffrage he had been called to his lofty station from among 
the people, and consequently, in dignity if not in person, he 
was head and shoulders above us all. We are wont, it may 
be from too great self-complacence, to account the station he 
occupied as the most dazzling in our world. To the chair of 
the President of the United States, we attach, and think 
we have reason to attach, more importance and solid glory 
than to any throne of any monarch upon the face of the 
globe, the throne of Queen Victoria herself not excepted. 
He who occupies it is there by the vote of a people independ- 
ent and self-governing, to serve them according to the Consti- 
tution and laws. In our estimation, he, that is placed by us 
on an elevation overtopping the thrones of the earth, is the 
Lord's anointed. No power below, save that which put him 
there, may call him to an account. Except by impeachment, 
conducted by rules carefully provided for it, he is beyond our 
reach. He is the nation's head, our legitimate ruler, a power 
from God. In fact, the providence of God places him Avhere 
he is, and says to us : " Touch not mine anointed." For him, 
every Christian is commanded in Scripture to make " supplica- 
tions, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks." To that 
power, embodied in the Chief Magistrate, every citizen must 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN - . 11 

be subject, rendering to him the things that are Cesar's, since 
he is God's minister, to whom the sword is given, that he may 
prove a terror to evil-doers, a praise to them that do well. 

Yet, the very individual, whom God and man had made 
so august by office, is ferociously assailed and destroyed by an 
assassin. The murder of any one is awful, and demands 
nothing short of death. " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by 
man shall his blood be shed." Regicide is exceedingly fla- 
grant. What, then, is that crime which, by unrighteous vio- 
lence, by assassination, takes from off the summit of earthly 
greatness, and hurries into a bloody and premature grave, the 
President of a free people ? Just a mere glance at such a 
crimson — scarlet — sin against the most illustrious occupant of 
the presidential chair, against the sovereignty of the nation, 
against the majesty of the Most High, and we instinctively 
shudder, intensely grieve. No man, whatever may have been 
his predilections, with due regard for the deference challenged 
by the greatest dignitary on earth, can be otherwise than over- 
come with deep perplexity, horror, and grief. For, what if, 
as a free people, we have our preferences, and may fearlessly 
and manfully express them by free speech, a free press, and a 
free ballot ? The more on that account, it behooves us to be a 
people, without one solitary exception, sensitive as it regards 
the life, health, character, and prosperity of him we have, of 
our own accord, in our own elected, constitutional way, exalted 
to be the chief of the nation. Hear it : let every freeman 
hear it ; let every one feel and say it : " We hold in utter, un- 
speakable abhorrence, the assassination of the President, and 
we mourn by reason of it, as they who refuse to be comforted." 

It will probably be admitted, the main particular, demand- 
ing and warranting sincere, Christian, patriotic grief, has been 
selected. Without infringing on the propriety or sacredness 
of the pulpit — the last of all places for political harangue or 
fulsome eulogy — it may be further adduced that as the exalted 
person, because of whose death we mourn this holy day in 
the house of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, was made 
such by his station, so, in many if not in all respects, he honor- 
ed that station. 



12 LAMENTATION ON THE 

Whether or not he was the greatest and best incumbent of 
our presidential chair, I leave to others to say or think just as 
they please. With those who can only speak of him with 
anger and aspersion, let there be no sympathy. Jucle, the 
servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, complains of 
those in his day who " despise dominion, and speak evil of 
dignities." The word of God is explicit on the point : " Thou 
shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people." It says to us : 
" Render, therefore, to all their dues ; tribute to whom tribute 
is due ; custom to whom custom ; fear to whom fear ; honor 
to whom honor." The evil-speaking, the wholesale slander, 
the unqualified denunciation, the calling of hard names pro 
and con., the venom of party-spirit, contributed much, un- 
doubtedly, toward bringing upon us the righteous judgment 
of God in one of the most harrowing forms. 

Our late President, whatever may have been his peculiar 
views on a subject that has long agitated, distressed, and en- 
dangered our land, or whatever may have been the line of 
policy he felt obligated to adopt and pursue, as being bound by 
solemn oath to support and defend the Constitution and laws 
of the United States, was for the Union, the whole Union, and 
nothing but the Union. Ashe took the chair, he lifted up his 
voice and declared he had no right, nor did he mean to inter- 
fere with that institution which had become peculiar to the 
South. Singular as it may now be regarded, the war, never- 
theless, came on. 

Again, like another President Jackson, he lifted up his voice, 
" The Union must and shall be preserved ;" adding, what gives 
special lustre to the determination, " either with or without 
slavery." In this respect he stood preeminent, peerless. He 
rises above all those miserable iiltraisms, those disorgan- 
izing principles and platforms, that almost everywhere through- 
out our borders, especially during presidential campaigns, ex- 
erted no insignificant influence to precipitate upon us the ter- 
rible scourge of civil war. What a towering, sublime, position 
was that of our President ! Was he not, did he not then de- 
monstrate that he was, an unconditional Union man ? He 
was for his country, his whole country, and nothing but his 
country. Had he then been responded to, how soon would 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 13 

the cannon have ceased to roar, belching forth destruction and 

death, or only roared in the triumph of good will and peace ! 

The policy subsequently taken, was, to many good citizens, 
more questionable. Still, they admired his course in giving 
fair warning to those who had seceded, that if, within a pre- 
scribed time, they did not lay down their arms and submit to 
what the Constitution and laws recpiired, he would, by pro- 
clamation, emancipate their slaves. lie was as good as his 
word. And though many thought a different process had 
sooner ended the war and been better for us, they knew the 
ruling passion of the President was to save the whole country. 
Sufficient, amply sufficient, too, is that one trait, ever looming 
up before us amid surrounding darkness and raging billows, 
to induce and impel every one to hold and exult : lie honor- 
ed his station : He did the best he knew to do. If he erred 
— it is human to err, the greatest and best are not infallible — 
he erred, if at all, in conscientiously endeavoring to save our 
endangered country. That conspicuous civic virtue alone, his 
conscientious effort to save the nation's life, to secure a con- 
tinued national integrity, apart from the position he occupied, 
as well as apart from aught else admirable or censurable, 
ought to embalm him in our hearts, and constrain us to be- 
wail his untimely end. 

We would also allude to a few other properties that charac- 
terized and adorned the departed. In social life, he is said 
and conceded to have been a most agreeable companion ; 
somewhat unpolished, perhaps, to fastidious etiquette and 
fashion, but, for that very exception, the more genial by rea- 
son of his sterling sense, humane heart, and playful humor. 
It is not surprising that they, who were favored to be his per- 
sonal friends, and enjoyed his confidence, are inconsolable. 

What must he not also have been in his family 2 We can 
almost hear the throbbing hearts and irrepressible sobs of his 
widow and children. We weep, we cannot but weep, with 
them. Her husband, their father, was the constitutional, hon- 
ored President of these United States. Yet he is suddenly 
snatched from their warm and fond embrace by the red hand 
of the assassin, just as he was about to reap the fruit of all his 
toil — the salvation of our country, and its rescue " from the 



14 LAMENTATION ON THE 

hand of strange children; whose month speaketh vanity; and 
their right hand is a right hand of falsehood." 

He was a man, too, who habitually frequented the house of 
God, where Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are worshipped — 
the only sacrifice made for sin, and the absolute need of reno- 
vating grace, plainly and openly avowed. He wonld seem to 
have been actuated by principle, predilection — not policy, not 
applause. 

Let, then, an unimpassioned survey, be taken of the man he 
was, by position and rare adaptation and can one that takes 
it be found among ourselves or anywhere in our land, who 
does not sincerely and profoundly grieve over the melancholy 
end of such a personage as Abraham Lincoln? 

What the dark providence justly and peremptorily claims is 
anticipated and rendered. 

The whole nation rises to mourn and weep ! Our gallant 
and victorious officers, soldiers, and sailors, mourn and weep ! 

Our statesmen, our senators and representatives, our gover- 
nors and legislators in the different States, our mayors and 
counsellors, our judges and advocates, our merchants and me- 
chanics, our capitalists and laborers, mourn and weep ! 

Our flags, over the land and over the waters, the forts and 
the arsenals, droop, draped in sable emblems ! 

The hum of business is hushed. Our cities, towns, and vil- 
lages, our rural districts though in the buoyant season of spring, 
mourn and weep! 

Churches of all denominations, synagogues, colleges, acade- 
mies, mourn and weep ! The church-going bell — where is not 
its funeral knell, its doleful lament, to be heard ? 

Private residences and inclosures, thousands of corporations, 
ten thousands of individuals, forgetful of political antagonism, 
indicate the nation's grief by some one or other sorrowful 
token ! 

Theatres close their doors. Accustomed as their actors are 
to the imitation of human passions, so as almost to make it 
like awful reality, they have not the heart just now to play. 
They, too, must mourn and weep ! 

Ambassadors from foreign courts express their horror at 
the atrocious crime, and tender us their condolence ! 



DEATH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 15 

All civilized nations, all who have regard for constitutional 
law, all who are interested in the self-government of a free 
people, upon hearing the sad tidings, will mourn with us and 
for us, that we should have had meted out to us such a fearful 
disaster ! 

Yet, the nation lives. Hope yet lights up our darkened ho- 
rizon. Our God controls all. The government of heaven and 
earth could not be on better shoulders than where it has been 
placed by our Father who is in heaven. Jesus Christ, our 
Lord and Saviour, is upon the throne. He lives. lie reigns 
" King of kings, and Lord of lords." He can so overrule what 
he has seen fit to permit, as to hasten that which we impa- 
tiently desire — the return of peace — peace upon sound princi- 
ples, peace upon the basis of constitutional liberty — such a 
peace, such a condition, such a national aggrandizement, that 
no State shall clash with another, that none shall rise up 
against the general government — which, in its turn, will scru- 
pulously respect the limits by which it was carefully circum- 
scribed when called into existence ; that there shall be here- 
after no North, no South, no East, no "West, no sectional jeal- 
ousy, no partisan animosity and strife, no provocation under 
any pretext, no libellous attack on constitutional law and 
order, no opposition, no violence against them, no rebellion, 
no war. 

By that Christianity, of which our exalted Lord and Saviour 
is the author and the finisher, a higher patriotism than the 
world has yet seen shall everywhere flourish. Our millions 
shall dwell together — every man beneath his own vine and fig- 
tree, worshipping his God according to the dictates of his own 
conscience, there being none, no tyrant-priest, no tyrant-prince, 
no tyrant-man, to disturb him or make him afraid — occupying, 
improving, enjoying, and honoring the most splendid inherit- 
ance ever vouchsafed to any nation beneath the heavens. 

« 

God save our country ! God save the President of the 
United States ! 



f*^^9 <M> 



4 



